Tengu (天狗, "heavenly dog") are a type of legendary creature found in Japanese folk religion and are also considered a type of Shinto god (kami) or yōkai (supernatural beings). Although they take their name from a dog-like Chinese demon (Tiangou), the tengu were originally thought to take the forms of birds of prey, and they are traditionally depicted with both human and avian characteristics. The earliest tengu were pictured with beaks, but this feature has often been humanized as an unnaturally long nose, which today is widely considered the tengu's defining characteristic in the popular imagination.

Buddhism long held that the tengu were disruptive demons and harbingers of war. Their image gradually softened, however, into one of protective, if still dangerous, spirits of the mountains and forests. Tengu are associated with the ascetic practice of Shugendō, and they are usually depicted in the garb of its followers, the yamabushi.

The tengu in art appears in a variety of shapes. It usually falls somewhere between a large, monstrous bird and a wholly anthropomorphized being, often with a red face or an unusually large or long nose. Early depictions of tengu show them as kite-like beings who can take a human-like form, often retaining avian wings, head or beak. The tengu's long nose seems to have been conceived in the 14th century, likely as a humanization of the original bird's bill.[1] This feature allies them with the Shinto deity Sarutahiko, who is described in the Japanese historical text the Nihon Shoki with a similar nose measuring seven hand-spans in length.[2] In village festivals the two figures are often portrayed with identical red, phallic-nosed mask designs.[3]

Some of the earliest representations of tengu appear in Japanese picture scrolls, such as the Tenguzōshi Emaki (天狗草子絵巻), painted c. 1296, which parodies high-ranking priests by endowing them the hawk-like beaks of tengu demons.[4]Tengu are often pictured as taking the shape of some sort of priest. Beginning in the 13th century, tengu came to be associated in particular with the yamabushi, the mountain ascetics who practice Shugendō.[5] The association soon found its way into Japanese art, where tengu are most frequently depicted in the yamabushi's distinctive costume, which includes a tokin and a pom-pommed sash (結袈裟,yuigesa).[6] Due to their priestly aesthetic, they are often shown wielding the Shakujo, a distinct staff used by Buddhist monks.[citation needed]

Tengu are commonly depicted holding a magical ha-uchiwa (羽団扇,"feather fan"), fans made of feathers. In folk tales, these fans sometimes have the ability to grow or shrink a person's nose, but usually they are attributed the power to stir up great winds. Various other strange accessories may be associated with tengu, such as a type of tall, one-toothed geta sandal often called tengu-geta.[7]

The term tengu and the characters used to write it are borrowed from the name of a fierce demon from Chinese folklore called tiāngoǔ. Chinese literature assigns this creature a variety of descriptions, but most often it is a fierce and anthropophagous canine monster that resembles a shooting star or comet. It makes a noise like thunder and brings war wherever it falls. One account from the Shù Yì Jì (述異記, "A Collection of Bizarre Stories"), written in 1791, describes a dog-like tiāngoǔ with a sharp beak and an upright posture, but usually tiāngoǔ bear little resemblance to their Japanese counterparts.[8]

The 23rd chapter of the Nihon Shoki, written in 720, is generally held to contain the first recorded mention of tengu in Japan. In this account a large shooting star appears and is identified by a Buddhist priest as a "heavenly dog", and much like the tiāngoǔ of China, the star precedes a military uprising. Although the Chinese characters for tengu are used in the text, accompanying phonetic furigana characters give the reading as amatsukitsune (heavenly fox). M. W. de Visser speculated that the early Japanese tengu may represent a conglomeration of two Chinese spirits: the tiāngoǔ and the fox spirits called huli jing.[9]

How the tengu was transformed from a dog-meteor into a bird-man is not clear. Some Japanese scholars have supported the theory that the tengu's image derives from that of the Hindu eagle deity Garuda, who was pluralized in Buddhist scripture as one of the major races of non-human beings. Like the tengu, the garuda are often portrayed in a human-like form with wings and a bird's beak. The name tengu seems to be written in place of that of the garuda in a Japanese sutra called the Emmyō Jizō-kyō (延命地蔵経), but this was likely written in the Edo period, long after the tengu's image was established. At least one early story in the Konjaku Monogatari describes a tengu carrying off a dragon, which is reminiscent of the garuda's feud with the nāga serpents. In other respects, however, the tengu's original behavior differs markedly from that of the garuda, which is generally friendly towards Buddhism. De Visser has speculated that the tengu may be descended from an ancient Shinto bird-demon which was syncretized with both the garuda and the tiāngoǔ when Buddhism arrived in Japan. However, he found little evidence to support this idea.[10]

A later version of the Kujiki, an ancient Japanese historical text, writes the name of Amanozako, a monstrous female deity born from the god Susanoo's spat-out ferocity, with characters meaning tengu deity (天狗神). The book describes Amanozako as a raging creature capable of flight, with the body of a human, the head of a beast, a long nose, long ears, and long teeth that can chew through swords. An 18th-century book called the Tengu Meigikō (天狗名義考) suggests that this goddess may be the true predecessor of the tengu, but the date and authenticity of the Kujiki, and of that edition in particular, remain disputed.[11]

Iga no Tsubone confronts the tormented spirit of Sasaki no Kiyotaka, by Yoshitoshi. Sasaki's ghost appears with the wings and claws of a tengu.

The Konjaku Monogatarishū, a collection of stories published in the late Heian period, contains some of the earliest tales of tengu, already characterized as they would be for centuries to come. These tengu are the troublesome opponents of Buddhism, who mislead the pious with false images of the Buddha, carry off monks and drop them in remote places, possess women in an attempt to seduce holy men, rob temples, and endow those who worship them with unholy power. They often disguise themselves as priests or nuns, but their true form seems to be that of a kite.[12]

Throughout the 12th and 13th centuries, accounts continued of tengu attempting to cause trouble in the world. They were now established as the ghosts of angry, vain, or heretical priests who had fallen on the "tengu-realm" (天狗道, tengudō). They began to possess people, especially women and girls, and speak through their mouths (kitsunetsuki). Still the enemies of Buddhism, the demons also turned their attention to the royal family. The Kojidan tells of an Empress who was possessed, and the Ōkagami reports that Emperor Sanjō was made blind by a tengu, the ghost of a priest who resented the throne.[13]

One notorious tengu from the 12th century was himself the ghost of an emperor. The Hōgen Monogatari tells the story of Emperor Sutoku, who was forced by his father to abandon the throne. When he later raised the Hōgen Rebellion to take back the country from Emperor Go-Shirakawa, he was defeated and exiled to Sanuki Province in Shikoku. According to legend he died in torment, having sworn to haunt the nation of Japan as a great demon, and thus became a fearsome tengu with long nails and eyes like a kite's.[14]

In stories from the 13th century, tengu began to abduct young boys as well as the priests they had always targeted. The boys were often returned, while the priests would be found tied to the tops of trees or other high places. All of the tengu's victims, however, would come back in a state of near death or madness, sometimes after having been tricked into eating animal dung.[5]

The tengu of this period were often conceived of as the ghosts of the arrogant, and as a result the creatures have become strongly associated with vanity and pride. Today the Japanese expression tengu ni naru ("becoming a tengu") is still used to describe a conceited person.[15]

In the Genpei Jōsuiki, written in the late Kamakura period, a god appears to Go-Shirakawa and gives a detailed account of tengu ghosts. He says that they fall onto the tengu road because, as Buddhists, they cannot go to Hell, yet as people with bad principles, they also cannot go to Heaven. He describes the appearance of different types of tengu: the ghosts of priests, nuns, ordinary men, and ordinary women, all of whom in life possessed excessive pride. The god introduces the notion that not all tengu are equal; knowledgeable men become daitengu (大天狗,greater tengu), but ignorant ones become kotengu (小天狗,small tengu).[16]

Daitengu are often pictured in a more human-like form than their underlings, and due to their long noses, they may also called hanatakatengu (鼻高天狗,tall-nosed tengu). Kotengu may conversely be depicted as more bird-like. They are sometimes called Karasu-Tengu (烏天狗,crow tengu), or koppa- or konoha-tengu (木葉天狗, 木の葉天狗,foliage tengu).[19]Inoue Enryō described two kinds of tengu in his Tenguron: the great daitengu, and the small, bird-like konoha-tengu who live in Cryptomeria trees. The konoha-tengu are noted in a book from 1746 called the Shokoku Rijin Dan (諸国里人談), as bird-like creatures with wings two meters across which were seen catching fish in the Ōi River, but this name rarely appears in literature otherwise.[20]

Creatures that do not fit the classic bird or yamabushi image are sometimes called tengu. For example, tengu in the guise of wood-spirits may be called guhin (occasionally written kuhin) (狗賓,dog guests), but this word can also refer to tengu with canine mouths or other features.[19] The people of Kōchi Prefecture on Shikoku believe in a creature called shibaten or shibatengu (シバテン, 芝天狗,lawn tengu), but this is a small childlike being who loves sumō wrestling and sometimes dwells in the water, and is generally considered one of the many kinds of kappa.[21] Another water-dwelling tengu is the kawatengu (川天狗,river tengu) of the Greater Tokyo Area. This creature is rarely seen, but it is believed to create strange fireballs and be a nuisance to fishermen.[22]

The Shasekishū, a book of Buddhist parables from the Kamakura period, makes a point of distinguishing between good and bad tengu. The book explains that the former are in command of the latter and are the protectors, not opponents, of Buddhism – although the flaw of pride or ambition has caused them to fall onto the demon road, they remain the same basically good, dharma-abiding persons they were in life.[23]

The tengu's unpleasant image continued to erode in the 17th century. Some stories now presented them as much less malicious, protecting and blessing Buddhist institutions rather than menacing them or setting them on fire. According to a legend in the 18th-century Kaidan Toshiotoko (怪談登志男), a tengu took the form of a yamabushi and faithfully served the abbot of a Zen monastery until the man guessed his attendant's true form. The tengu's wings and huge nose then reappeared. The tengu requested a piece of wisdom from his master and left, but he continued, unseen, to provide the monastery with miraculous aid.[24]

A Yamabushi Tengu (山伏天狗)

In the 18th and 19th centuries, tengu came to be feared as the vigilant protectors of certain forests. In the 1764 collection of strange stories Sanshu Kidan (三州奇談), a tale tells of a man who wanders into a deep valley while gathering leaves, only to be faced with a sudden and ferocious hailstorm. A group of peasants later tell him that he was in the valley where the guhin live, and anyone who takes a single leaf from that place will surely die. In the Sōzan Chomon Kishū (想山著聞奇集), written in 1849, the author describes the customs of the wood-cutters of Mino Province, who used a sort of rice cake called kuhin-mochi to placate the tengu, who would otherwise perpetrate all sorts of mischief. In other provinces a special kind of fish called okoze was offered to the tengu by woodsmen and hunters, in exchange for a successful day's work.[25] The people of Ishikawa Prefecture have until recently believed that the tengu loathe mackerel, and have used this fish as a charm against kidnappings and hauntings by the mischievous spirits.[26]

Tengu are worshipped as beneficial kami (gods or revered spirits) in various Japanese religious cults. For example, the tengu Saburō of Izuna is worshipped on that mountain and various others as Izuna Gongen (飯綱権現, "incarnation of Izuna"), one of the primary deities in the Izuna Shugen cult, which also has ties to fox sorcery and the Dakini of Tantric Buddhism. Izuna Gongen is depicted as a beaked, winged figure with snakes wrapped around his limbs, surrounded by a halo of flame, riding on the back of a fox and brandishing a sword. Worshippers of tengu on other sacred mountains have adopted similar images for their deities, such as Sanjakubō (三尺坊) or Akiba Gongen (秋葉権現) of Akiba and Dōryō Gongen (道了権現) of Saijō-ji Temple in Odawara.[27]

Tengu appear frequently in the orally transmitted tales collected by Japanese folklorists. As these stories are often humorous, they tend to portray tengu as ridiculous creatures who are easily tricked or confused by humans. Some common folk tales in which tengu appear include:

"The Tengu's Magic Cloak" (天狗の隠れみの,Tengu no Kakuremino): A boy looks through an ordinary piece of bamboo and pretends he can see distant places. A tengu, overwhelmed by curiosity, offers to trade it for a magic straw cloak that renders the wearer invisible. Having duped the tengu, the boy continues his mischief while wearing the cloak. Another version of this story tells of an ugly old man who tricks a tengu into giving him his magical cloak and causes mayhem for his fellow villagers. The story ends with the tengu regaining the coat through a game of riddle exchange and punishes the man by turning him into a wolf.[28]

"The Old Man's Lump Removed" (瘤取り爺さん,Kobu-tori Jiisan): An old man has a lump or tumor on his face. In the mountains he encounters a band of tengu making merry and joins their dancing. He pleases them so much that they want him to join them the next night, and offer a gift for him. In addition, they take the lump off his face, thinking that he will want it back and therefore have to join them the next night. An unpleasant neighbor, who also has a lump, hears of the old man's good fortune and attempts to repeat it, and steal the gift. The tengu, however, simply give him the first lump in addition to his own, because they are disgusted by his bad dancing, and because he tried to steal the gift.[29]

"The Tengu's Fan" (天狗の羽団扇,Tengu no Hauchiwa) A scoundrel obtains a tengu's magic fan, which can shrink or grow noses. He secretly uses this item to grotesquely extend the nose of a rich man's daughter, and then shrinks it again in exchange for her hand in marriage. Later he accidentally fans himself while he dozes, and his nose grows so long it reaches heaven, resulting in painful misfortune for him.[30]

"The Tengu's Gourd" (天狗の瓢箪,"Tengu no Hyōtan"): A gambler meets a tengu, who asks him what he is most frightened of. The gambler lies, claiming that he is terrified of gold or mochi. The tengu answers truthfully that he is frightened of a kind of plant or some other mundane item. The tengu, thinking he is playing a cruel trick, then causes money or rice cakes to rain down on the gambler. The gambler is of course delighted and proceeds to scare the tengu away with the thing he fears most. The gambler then obtains the tengu's magic gourd (or another treasured item) that was left behind.[31]

"The Tengu, and the Woodcutter": A tengu bothers a woodcutter, showing off his supernatural abilities by guessing everything the man is thinking. The woodcutter swings his axe, and a splinter of wood hits the tengu on the nose. The tengu flees in terror, exclaiming that humans are dangerous creatures who can do things without thinking about them.[32]

Crow-Tengu (karasu-tengu) supervising a competition with small bows. Printed in Yōkyu hidensho (Secret Tradition of the Small Bow), 1687

Ushiwaka-maru training with the tengu of Mount Kurama, by Kunitsuna Utagawa. This subject is very common in ukiyo-e.

Japan's regent Hōjō Tokimune, who showed down the Mongols, fights off tengu

During the 14th century, the tengu began to trouble the world outside of the Buddhist clergy, and like their ominous ancestors the tiāngǒu, the tengu became creatures associated with war.[33] Legends eventually ascribed to them great knowledge in the art of skilled combat.

This reputation seems to have its origins in a legend surrounding the famous warrior Minamoto no Yoshitsune. When Yoshitsune was a young boy going by the name of Ushiwaka-maru, his father, Yoshitomo, was assassinated by the Taira clan. Taira no Kiyomori, head of the Taira, allowed the child to survive on the grounds that he be exiled to the temple on Mount Kurama and become a monk. But one day in the Sōjō-ga-dani Valley, Ushiwaka encountered the mountain's tengu, Sōjōbō. This spirit taught the boy the art of swordsmanship so that he might bring vengeance on the Taira.[34]

Originally the actions of this tengu were portrayed as another attempt by demons to throw the world into chaos and war, but as Yoshitsune's renown as a legendary warrior increased, his monstrous teacher came to be depicted in a much more sympathetic and honorable light. In one of the most famous renditions of the story, the Noh play Kurama Tengu, Ushiwaka is the only person from his temple who does not give up an outing in disgust at the sight of a strange yamabushi. Sōjōbō thus befriends the boy and teaches him out of sympathy for his plight.[35]

Two stories from the 19th century continue this theme: In the Sōzan Chomon Kishū, a boy is carried off by a tengu and spends three years with the creature. He comes home with a magic gun that never misses a shot. A story from Inaba Province, related by Inoue Enryō, tells of a girl with poor manual dexterity who is suddenly possessed by a tengu. The spirit wishes to rekindle the declining art of swordsmanship in the world. Soon a young samurai appears to whom the tengu has appeared in a dream, and the possessed girl instructs him as an expert swordsman.[36] Some rumors surrounding the ninja indicate that they were also instructed by the tengu.[19]

Profoundly entrenched in the Japanese imagination for centuries, tengu continue to be popular subjects in modern fiction, both in Japan and other countries. They often appear among the many characters and creatures featured in Japanese cinema, animation, comics, role-playing games, and video games.

The UnicodeEmoji character U+1F47A (👺) represents a Tengu, under the name "Japanese Goblin".

^de Visser, p. 84; Mizuki 2003, p. 70. The term konoha-tengu is often mentioned in English texts as a synonym for daitengu, but this appears to be a widely repeated mistake which is not corroborated by Japanese-language sources.

^Outlined in Japanese here. For another example see the picture scroll Tengu no DairihereArchived 2007-06-09 at the Wayback Machine., in which the tengu of Mount Kurama is working with a Buddha (who was once Yoshitsune's father) to overthrow the Taira clan. This indicates that the tengu is now involved in a righteous cause rather than an act of wickedness.

1.
Japanese mythology
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Japanese mythology embraces Shinto and Buddhist traditions as well as agriculturally-based folk religion. The Shinto pantheon comprises innumerable kami and this article will discuss only the typical elements present in Asian mythology, such as cosmogony, important deities, and the best-known Japanese stories. Japanese myths, as recognized in the mainstream today, are based on the Kojiki, the Nihon Shoki. The Kojiki, or Record of Ancient Matters, is the oldest surviving account of Japans myths, legends, the Shintōshū describes the origins of Japanese deities from a Buddhist perspective, while the Hotsuma Tsutae records a substantially different version of the mythology. One notable feature of Japanese mythology is its explanation of the origin of the Imperial Family, the title of the Emperor of Japan, tennō, means heavenly sovereign. Later, the seven generations of kami, known as Kamiyonanayo, emerged, following the formation of heaven and earth. The first two generations are individual deities called hitorigami, while the five that followed came into being as male/female pairs of kami, in this chronicle, the Kamiyonanayo comprise 12 deities in total. Japans creation narrative can be divided into the birth of the deities, to help them to achieve this, Izanagi and Izanami were given a naginata decorated with jewels, named Ame-no-nuboko. The two deities then went to the bridge between heaven and earth, Amenoukihashi and churned the sea below with the halberd, drops of salty water formed the island, Onogoro. The deities descended from the bridge of heaven and made their home on the island, eventually, they fell in love and wished to mate. So they built a pillar called Amenomihashira around which they built a palace called Yashirodono, Izanagi and Izanami circled the pillar in opposite directions, and when they met on the other side, Izanami, the female deity, spoke first in greeting. Izanagi didnt think that this was proper, but they mated anyway and they had two children, Hiruko and Awashima, but the children were badly formed and are not considered gods in their original form. The parents, who were dismayed at their misfortune, put the children into a boat and sent them to sea, so Izanagi and Izanami went around the pillar again, and this time, when they met, Izanagi spoke first. Izanami died giving birth to Kagutsuchi, also called Homusubi due to severe burns and she was then buried on Mount Hiba, at the border of the old provinces of Izumo and Hoki, near modern-day Yasugi of Shimane Prefecture. His death also created dozens of deities, the gods who were born from Izanagi and Izanami are symbolic aspects of nature and culture. Izanagi lamented the death of Izanami and undertook a journey to Yomi, Izanagi found little difference between Yomi and the land above, except for the eternal darkness. However, this suffocating darkness was enough to make him ache for light, quickly, he searched for Izanami and found her. At first, Izanagi could not see her for she was hidden in the shadows

2.
Mythology
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Mythology refers variously to the collected myths of a group of people or to the study of such myths. Myths are the people tell to explain nature, history. Myth is a feature of every culture, mythologizing continues, as shown in contemporary mythopoeia such as urban legends and the expansive fictional mythoi created by fantasy novels and comics. A cultures collective mythology helps convey belonging, shared and religious experiences, behavioral models, the study of myth began in ancient history. Rival classes of the Greek myths by Euhemerus, Plato and Sallustius were developed by the Neoplatonists, the nineteenth-century comparative mythology reinterpreted myth as a primitive and failed counterpart of science, a disease of language, or a misinterpretation of magical ritual. Recent approaches often view myths as manifestations of psychological, cultural, or societal truths, the term mythology predates the word myth by centuries. It first appeared in the fifteenth-century, borrowed from the Middle French term mythologie, the word mythology, comes from Middle French mythologie, from Late Latin mythologia, from Greek μυθολογία mythología from μῦθος mythos and -λογία -logia. The word mythología appears in Plato, but was used as a term for fiction or story-telling of any kind, combining mỹthos. From Lydgate until the seventeenth or eighteenth-century, mythology was similarly used to mean a moral, fable, from its earliest use in reference to a collection of traditional stories or beliefs, mythology implied the falsehood of the stories being described. It came to be applied by analogy with similar bodies of traditional stories among other cultures around the world. The Greek loanword mythos and Latinate mythus both appeared in English before the first example of myth in 1830, in present use, mythology usually refers to the collected myths of a group of people, but may also mean the study of such myths. For example, Greek mythology, Roman mythology and Hittite mythology all describe the body of myths retold among those cultures, dundes defined myth as a sacred narrative that explains how the world and humanity evolved into their present form. Lincoln defined myth as ideology in narrative form, scholars in other fields use the term myth in varied ways. In a broad sense, the word can refer to any traditional story, due to this pejorative sense, some scholars opted for the term mythos. Its use was similarly pejorative and now commonly refers to its Aristotelian sense as a plot point or to a collective mythology. The term is distinguished from didactic literature such as fables. Main characters in myths are usually gods, demigods or supernatural humans, however, many exceptions or combinations exist, as in the Iliad, Odyssey and Aeneid. Myths are often endorsed by rulers and priests and are linked to religion or spirituality

3.
Deity
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A deity is a concept conceived in diverse ways in various cultures, typically as a natural or supernatural being considered divine or sacred. A male deity is a god, while a female deity is a goddess, the Oxford reference defines deity as a god or goddess, or anything revered as divine. Various cultures have conceptualized a deity differently than a monotheistic God, a plain deity need not be omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, or eternal, however an almighty monotheistic God generally does have these attributes. Monotheistic religions typically refer to God in masculine terms, while other religions refer to their deities in a variety of ways – masculine, feminine, androgynous, some Avestan and Vedic deities were viewed as ethical concepts. In Indian religions, deities have been envisioned as manifesting within the temple of every living beings body, as sensory organs, but in Indian religions, all deities are also subject to death when their merit runs out. The English language word deity derives from Old French deité, the Latin deitatem or divine nature, deus is related through a common Proto-Indo-European language origin to *deiwos. Deva is masculine, and the feminine equivalent is devi. Etymologically, the cognates of Devi are Latin dea and Greek thea, in Old Persian, daiva- means demon, evil god, while in Sanskrit it means the opposite, referring to the heavenly, divine, terrestrial things of high excellence, exalted, shining ones. The closely linked term god refers to supreme being, deity, which states Douglas Harper, is derived from Proto-Germanic *guthan, from PIE *ghut-, guth in the Irish language means voice. The term *ghut- is also the source of Old Church Slavonic zovo, Sanskrit huta-, from the root *gheu- An alternate etymology for the term god traces it to the PIE root *ghu-to-, the term *gheu- is also the source of the Greek khein to pour. Originally the German root was a noun, but the gender of the monotheistic God shifted to masculine under the influence of Christianity. In contrast, all ancient Indo-European cultures and mythologies recognized both masculine and feminine deities, the term deity often connotes the concept of sacred or divine, as a god or goddess, in a polytheistic religion. However, there is no accepted consensus concept of deity across religions and cultures. Huw Owen states that the deity or god or its equivalent in other languages has a bewildering range of meanings. Some engravings or sketches show animals, hunters or rituals, the Venus of Willendorf, a female figurine found in Europe and dated to about 25,000 BCE has been interpreted as an exemplar of a prehistoric divine feminine. In Buddhist mythology, devas are beings inhabiting certain happily placed worlds of Buddhist cosmology and these beings are mortal and numerous. It is also common for iṣṭadevatās to be called deities, although the nature of Yidams is distinct from what is meant by the term. Buddhism does not believe in a creator deity, however, deities are an essential part of Buddhist cosmology, rebirth and Saṃsāra doctrines

4.
Seven Lucky Gods
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The Seven Lucky Gods or Seven Gods of Fortune are believed to grant good luck and often have their place in netsuke engravings or in other representations. Amongst the seven, not all the gods are mythical characters and they all began as remote and impersonal gods, but gradually became much closer canonical figures for certain professions and Japanese arts. During the course of its history, the influence between gods has created confusion about which of them was the patron of certain professions. The worship of this group of gods is also due to the importance of the seven in Japan. These gods have been recognized as such for over a thousand years ago by a number of followers. In the beginning, these gods were worshiped by merchants as the first two of them were gods of business and trade. In ancient times, these gods were worshiped separately, but it happens today – only when it is required for the god to act on behalf of the applicant. The Seven Gods of Fortune started being mentioned as a collective by the year 1420 in Fushimi, in order to imitate the processions of the Daimyo, shortly after a famous artist of the time, Kano Yasunobu, was ordained to portray these gods for the first time ever. From the period of the gods Izanami and Izanagi, Ebisu is the one whose origins are purely Japanese. He is the god of prosperity and wealth in business, and of abundance in crops, cereals and it is now common to see his figure in restaurants where fish is served in great quantities or in household kitchens. Daikokuten is also one of the Shichifukujin and he is the god of commerce and prosperity. There are other characteristics which have also attributed to him, such as being the patron of cooks, farmers, bankers. This god is characterized by his smile, having short legs and he is usually depicted with a bag full of valuable objects. Daikokuten originated as a conflation of the Buddhist death deity Mahākāla with the Shinto deity Ōkuninushi. The Japanese name Daikoku and the Hindi name Mahakala both translate to Great Blackness, per the Butsuzōzui compendium of 1690, Daikoku can also manifest as a female known as Daikokunyo or Daikokutennyo. His origins can be traced back to Hinduism, but he has adapted by the Japanese culture. He comes from the Hindu god Kubera and is known by the name Vaisravana from Hindu culture. He is the god of fortune in war and battles, also associated with authority and dignity and he is literally the protector of those who follow the rules and behave appropriately

5.
Legend
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Legend, for its active and passive participants, includes no happenings that are outside the realm of possibility, but may include miracles. Legends may be transformed over time, in order to keep fresh and vital. Many legends operate within the realm of uncertainty, never being believed by the participants. The Brothers Grimm defined legend as folktale historically grounded, a modern folklorists professional definition of legend was proposed by Timothy R. Legend is a loanword from Old French that entered English usage circa 1340. The Old French noun legende derives from the Medieval Latin legenda, in its early English-language usage, the word indicated a narrative of an event. The word legendary was originally a noun meaning a collection or corpus of legends and this word changed to legendry, and legendary became the adjectival form. By 1613, English-speaking Protestants began to use the word when they wished to imply that an event was fictitious, thus, legend gained its modern connotations of undocumented and spurious, which distinguish it from the meaning of chronicle. In 1866, Jacob Grimm described the tale as poetic. Questions of categorising legends, in hopes of compiling a series of categories on the line of the Aarne–Thompson folktale index. Compared to the highly structured folktale, legend is comparatively amorphous, in Einleitung in der Geschichtswissenschaft, Ernst Bernheim asserted that a legend is simply a longstanding rumour. Gordon Allport credited the staying-power of some rumours to the persistent cultural state-of-mind that they embody and capsulise, in the narrow Christian sense, legenda were hagiographical accounts, often collected in a legendary. Hippolyte Delehaye distinguished legend from myth, The legend, on the hand, has, of necessity. It refers imaginary events to some real personage, or it localizes romantic stories in some definite spot, stories that exceed the boundaries of realism are called fables. For example, the talking animal formula of Aesop identifies his brief stories as fables, the parable of the Prodigal Son would be a legend if it were told as having actually happened to a specific son of a historical father. If it included a donkey that gave sage advice to the Prodigal Son it would be a fable, Legend may be transmitted orally, passed on person-to-person, or, in the original sense, through written text. Jacob de Voragines Legenda Aurea or The Golden Legend comprises a series of vitae or instructive biographical narratives and they are presented as lives of the saints, but the profusion of miraculous happenings and above all their uncritical context are characteristics of hagiography. The Legenda was intended to inspire extemporized homilies and sermons appropriate to the saint of the day, the vanishing hitchhiker is the best-known urban legend in America, traceable as far back as 1870, but it is found around the world including in Korea and Russia. In the legend, a girl in a white dress picked up alongside of the road by a passerby

6.
Mount Hiei
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Mount Hiei is a mountain to the northeast of Kyoto, lying on the border between the Kyoto and Shiga Prefectures, Japan. The temple of Enryaku-ji, the first outpost of the Japanese Tendai sect of Buddhism, was founded atop Mount Hiei by Saichō in 788, hōnen, Nichiren, and Shinran all studied at the temple before leaving to start their own practices. The temple complex was razed by Oda Nobunaga in 1571 to quell the rising power of the Tendais warrior monks, Mount Hiei has featured in many folk tales over the ages. Originally it was thought to be the home of gods and demons of Shinto lore, although it is predominantly known for the Buddhist monks that come from the temple of Enryaku-ji. John Stevens wrote the book The Marathon Monks of Mount Hiei, chronicling the practice of walking long distances – up to 52 miles a day for 100 straight days, the practice of walking is known as the kaihōgyō. A2010 US National Public Radio report described the sennichi kaihōgyō as.1,000 days of walking meditation, walked 26 miles a day for periods of either 100 or 200 consecutive days — a total distance about the same as walking around the Earth. Beyond the mountain itself, its forests, and the views it affords – of Kyoto, of Ohara, of lake Biwa, the temple complex spreads out over the mountain, but is concentrated in three areas, connected by foot trails. There are also more minor temples and shrines, the mountain is busiest during the daytime, but has some visitors in the evenings, for light-up displays and to see the night view of the surrounding towns. The mountain is an area for hikers and a toll road provides access by automobile to the top of the mountain. The attractions on the mountain are quite out, so there are regular buses during the daytime connecting the attractions. The center for these is the bus center, in front of the entrance to the temple complex at Tō-tō. Hiei Area JAPAN, the Official Guide Holly Schmid, Marathon Monks of Mount Hiei Photos of Mount Hiei and the three precincts of Enryakuji Temple Hieizan Enryakuji

7.
Mount Fuji
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Mount Fuji, located on Honshu Island, is the highest mountain in Japan at 3,776.24 m. An active stratovolcano that last erupted in 1707–08, Mount Fuji lies about 100 kilometres south-west of Tokyo, Mount Fuji is one of Japans Three Holy Mountains along with Mount Tate and Mount Haku. It is also a Special Place of Scenic Beauty and one of Japans Historic Sites and it was added to the World Heritage List as a Cultural Site on June 22,2013. Per UNESCO, Mount Fuji has inspired artists and poets and been the object of pilgrimage for centuries, UNESCO recognizes 25 sites of cultural interest within the Mt. Fuji locality. These 25 locations include the mountain itself, Fujisan, in Shinto mythology, Kuninotokotachi is one of the two gods born from something like a reed that arose from the soil when the earth was chaotic. He is known by mythology to reside on top of Mount Fuji, Kuninotokotachi is described as a hitorigami and genderless in Kojiki, while as a male god in Nihon Shoki. Yoshida Kanetomo, the founder of the Yoshida Shintō sect, identified Kuninotokotachi with Amenominakanushi, the current kanji for Mount Fuji, 富 and 士, mean wealth or abundant and a man with a certain status respectively. The origin of the name Fuji is unclear, having no recording of it being first called by this name. A text of the 10th century, Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, says that the name came from immortal, an early folk etymology claims that Fuji came from 不二, meaning without equal or nonpareil. Another claims that it came from 不尽, meaning neverending, a Japanese classical scholar in the Edo era, Hirata Atsutane, speculated that the name is from a word meaning, a mountain standing up shapely as an ear of a rice plant. It is also pointed that huchi means an old woman and ape is the word for fire, research on the distribution of place names that include fuji as a part also suggest the origin of the word fuji is in the Yamato language rather than Ainu. A Japanese toponymist Kanji Kagami argued that the name has the root as wisteria and rainbow. In English, the mountain is known as Mount Fuji, some sources refer to it as Fuji-san, Fujiyama or, redundantly, Mt. Fujiyama. Japanese speakers refer to the mountain as Fuji-san and this san is not the honorific suffix used with peoples names, such as Watanabe-san, but the Sino-Japanese reading of the character yama used in Sino-Japanese compounds. In Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki romanization, the name is transliterated as Huzi, among the most renowned works are Hokusais 36 Views of Mount Fuji and his One Hundred Views of Mount Fuji, as well as Utagawa Hiroshiges similarly-titled 36 Views of Mount Fuji. The mountain is mentioned in Japanese literature throughout the ages and is the subject of many poems and it is thought that the first recorded ascent was in 663 by an anonymous monk. The summit has been thought of as sacred since ancient times and was forbidden to women until the Meiji Era, ancient samurai used the base of the mountain as a remote training area, near the present-day town of Gotemba. The shogun Minamoto no Yoritomo held yabusame in the area in the early Kamakura period, the first ascent by a foreigner was by Sir Rutherford Alcock in September 1868, from the foot of the mountain to the top in eight hours and three hours for the descent

8.
Buddhism in Japan
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Buddhism has been practiced in Japan since its official introduction in 552 AD according to the Nihon Shoki from Baekje, Korea by Buddhist monks. Though some Chinese sources place the first spreading of the religion earlier during the Kofun period, Buddhism has had a major influence on the development of Japanese society and remains an influential aspect of the culture to this day. In modern times, Japans most popular schools of Buddhism are Pure Land Buddhism, Nichiren Buddhism, Shingon Buddhism, as of 2008 approximately 34% of the Japanese identify as Buddhists and the number has been growing since the 1980s. In 2009, a survey showed that over half the Japanese families had a butsudan or Buddhist altar in their homes. In 2009 data from the Agency of Cultural Affairs stated that there were 89 million Buddhists in Japan, in 2011, after the Tsunami, it was reported that 90% of the Japanese identified as Buddhist or Shinto or a combination of both. In 2013, official said there were over 87 million Buddhists in Japan. The arrival of Buddhism in Japan is ultimately a consequence of the first contacts between China and Central Asia, where Buddhism had spread from the Indian subcontinent. These contacts occurred with the opening of the Silk Road in the 2nd century BC and these contacts culminated with the official introduction of Buddhism in China in 67 CE. Historians generally agree that by the middle of the 1st century, according to the Book of Liang, which was written in 635, five Buddhist monks from Gandhara traveled to Japan in 467. In former times, the people of Fusang knew nothing of the Buddhist religion and they propagated Buddhist doctrine, circulated scriptures and drawings, and advised the people to relinquish worldly attachments. As a result the customs of Fusang changed, the powerful Soga clan played a key role in the early spread of Buddhism in the country. Initial uptake of the new faith was slow, and Buddhism only started to spread some years later when Empress Suiko openly encouraged the acceptance of Buddhism among all Japanese people. On January 15,593, Soga no Umako ordered relics of Buddha deposited inside the stone under the pillar of a pagoda at Asuka-dera. In 607, in order to obtain copies of sutras, an envoy was dispatched to Sui China. As time progressed and the number of Buddhist clergy increased, the offices of Sōjō, by 627, there were 46 Buddhist temples,816 Buddhist priests, and 569 Buddhist nuns in Japan. These were not exclusive schools, and temples were apt to have scholars versed in several of the schools and it has been suggested that they can best be thought of as study groups. This kind of Buddhism had little to offer the illiterate and uneducated masses and their practice was a combination of Buddhist and Daoist elements and the incorporation of shamanistic features of indigenous practices. Some of these figures became popular, and were a source of criticism towards the sophisticated academic and bureaucratic Buddhism of the capital

9.
Bon Festival
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Obon or just Bon is a Japanese Buddhist custom to honor the spirits of ones ancestors. It has been celebrated in Japan for more than 500 years and traditionally includes a dance, the festival of Obon lasts for three days, however its starting date varies within different regions of Japan. When the lunar calendar was changed to the Gregorian calendar at the beginning of the Meiji era, the localities in Japan reacted differently, shichigatsu Bon is based on the solar calendar and is celebrated around 15 July in eastern Japan, coinciding with Chūgen. Hachigatsu Bon is based on the calendar, is celebrated around the 15th of August and is the most commonly celebrated time. Kyū Bon is celebrated on the 15th day of the month of the lunar calendar. Kyū Bon is celebrated in areas like the part of the Kantō region, Chūgoku region, Shikoku. These three days are not listed as public holidays but it is customary that people are given leave, Obon is a shortened form of Ullambana. It is Sanskrit for hanging upside down and implies great suffering, the Japanese believe they should ameliorate the suffering of the Urabanna. Bon Odori originates from the story of Maha Maudgalyayana, a disciple of the Buddha and he discovered she had fallen into the Realm of Hungry Ghosts and was suffering. Greatly disturbed, he went to the Buddha and asked how he could release his mother from this realm, Buddha instructed him to make offerings to the many Buddhist monks who had just completed their summer retreat, on the fifteenth day of the seventh month. The disciple did this and, thus, saw his mothers release and he also began to see the true nature of her past selflessness and the many sacrifices that she had made for him. The disciple, happy because of his mothers release and grateful for his mothers kindness, from this dance of joy comes Bon Odori or Bon Dance, a time in which ancestors and their sacrifices are remembered and appreciated. As Obon occurs in the heat of the summer, participants traditionally wear yukata, many Obon celebrations include a huge carnival with rides, games, and summer festival food like watermelon. Families sent their ancestors back to their permanent dwelling place under the guidance of fire. Fire, which marked the commencement as well as the closing of the festival, Bon Odori, meaning simply Bon dance, is a style of dancing performed during Obon. Originally a Nenbutsu folk dance to welcome the spirits of the dead, each region has a local dance, as well as different music. The music can be songs specifically pertinent to the message of Obon. Consequently, the Bon dance will look and sound different from region to region, hokkaidō is known for a folk-song known as Sōran Bushi

10.
Torii
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A torii is a traditional Japanese gate most commonly found at the entrance of or within a Shinto shrine, where it symbolically marks the transition from the profane to the sacred. The presence of a torii at the entrance is usually the simplest way to identify Shinto shrines, and they are however a common sight at Japanese Buddhist temples too, where they stand at the entrance of the temples own shrine, called chinjusha and are usually very small. Their first appearance in Japan can be pinpointed to at least the mid-Heian period because they are mentioned in a text written in 922. The oldest existing stone torii was built in the 12th century, the oldest wooden torii is a ryōbu torii at Kubō Hachiman Shrine in Yamanashi prefecture built in 1535. Torii were traditionally made from wood or stone, but today they can be made of reinforced concrete, copper. They are usually either unpainted or painted vermilion with a black upper lintel, Inari shrines typically have many torii because those who have been successful in business often donate in gratitude a torii to Inari, kami of fertility and industry. Fushimi Inari-taisha in Kyoto has thousands of torii, each bearing the donors name. The function of a torii is to mark the entrance to a sacred space, for this reason, the road leading to a Shinto shrine is almost always straddled by one or more torii, which are therefore the easiest way to distinguish a shrine from a Buddhist temple. If the sandō passes under multiple torii, the outer of them is called ichi no torii, the following ones, closer to the shrine, are usually called, in order, ni no torii and san no torii. Other torii can be found farther into the shrine to represent increasing levels of holiness as one nears the inner sanctuary, Also, because of the strong relationship between Shinto shrines and the Japanese Imperial family, a torii stands also in front of the tombs of each Emperor. Whether torii existed in Japan before Buddhism or, to the contrary, arrived with it is, however, in the past torii must have been used also at the entrance of Buddhist temples. Even today, as prominent a temple as Osakas Shitennō-ji, founded in 593 by Shōtoku Taishi, many Buddhist temples include one or more Shinto shrines dedicated to their tutelary kami, and in that case a torii marks the shrines entrance. Benzaiten is a syncretic goddess derived from the Indian divinity Sarasvati which unites elements of both Shinto and Buddhism, for this reason halls dedicated to her can be found at both temples and shrines, and in either case in front of the hall stands a torii. The goddess herself is sometimes portrayed with a torii on her head, finally, until the Meiji period torii were routinely adorned with plaques carrying Buddhist sutras. The association between Japanese Buddhism and the torii is therefore old and profound, yamabushi, Japanese mountain ascetic hermits with a long tradition as mighty warriors endowed with supernatural powers, sometimes use as their symbol a torii. The torii is also used as a symbol of Japan in non-religious contexts. For example, it is the symbol of the Marine Corps Security Force Regiment, the origins of the torii are unknown and there are several different theories on the subject, none of which has gained universal acceptance. They may, for example, have originated in India from the gates in the monastery of Sanchi in central India

11.
Shinto shrine
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A Shinto shrine is a structure whose main purpose is to house one or more Shinto kami. Its most important building is used for the safekeeping of sacred objects, structurally, a Shinto shrine is usually characterized by the presence of a honden or sanctuary, where the kami is enshrined. The honden may however be completely absent, as for example when the stands on a sacred mountain to which it is dedicated. There may be a haiden and other structures as well, however, a shrines most important building is used for the safekeeping of sacred objects rather than for worship. Miniature shrines can occasionally be found on roadsides, large shrines sometimes have on their precincts miniature shrines. The portable shrines which are carried on poles during festivals enshrine kami and are therefore true shrines. in 927 CE and this work listed all of the 2,861 Shinto shrines existing at the time, and the 3,131 official-recognized and enshrined Kami. Certainly, that number has grown and greatly exceeded this figure through the following generations, in Agency for Cultural Affairs in Japan placed the number of shrines at 79,467, mostly affiliated with the Association of Shinto Shrines. Some shrines, such as the Yasukuni Shrine are totally independent of any outside authority, the number of Shinto shrines in Japan is estimated to be around 100,000. This figure may, or may not, include private shrines in homes and owned by groups, abandoned or derelict shrines. Ancestors are kami to be worshiped, yayoi-period village councils sought the advice of ancestors and other kami, and developed instruments to evoke them. Yoshishiro means approach substitute and were conceived to attract the kami to allow them physical space, village-council sessions were held in quiet spots in the mountains or in forests near great trees or other natural objects that served as yorishiro. These sacred places and their yorishiro gradually evolved into todays shrines, whose origins can be seen in the Japanese words for mountain and forest. Many shrines have on their grounds one of the original great yorishiro, the first buildings at places dedicated to worship were surely huts built to house some yorishiro. A trace of this origin can be found in the term hokura, deity storehouse, which evolved into hokora, true shrines arose with the beginning of agriculture, when the need arose to attract kami to ensure good harvests. These were, however, just temporary structures built for a particular purpose, Ōmiwa Shrine in Nara, for example, contains no sacred images or objects because it is believed to serve the mountain on which it stands. Those images or objects are therefore unnecessary, for the same reason, it has a worship hall but no place to house the kami. Archeology confirms that, during the Yayoi period, the most common shintai in the earliest shrines were nearby mountain peaks that supplied water to the plains where people lived. Besides the already mentioned Ōmiwa Shrine, another important example is Mount Nantai, significantly, the name Nantai means mans body

A Shinto shrine (神社, jinja, archaic: shinsha, meaning: "place of the god(s)") is a structure whose main purpose is to …

Two women praying in front of a shrine

Mount Nantai, worshiped at Futarasan Shrine, has the shape of the phallic stone rods found in pre-agricultural Jōmon sites.

An example of jingū-ji:Tsurugaoka Hachiman-gū-ji in an old drawing. In the foreground the shrine-temple's Buddhist structures (not extant), among them a pagoda, a belltower and a niōmon. The shrine (extant) is above.